The present invention relates to hand-holdable optical scanners for scanning record media. The invention is particularly useful in the optical scanner described in our Israel Patent Application No. 114,367 filed Jun. 27, 1995, and is therefore described below with respect to that application.
Our Israel Patent Application 114,367 describes a hand-holdable optical scanner for scanning printed text on record media and for simultaneously translating the words from one language into another, or from one definition to another in the same language. Critical requirements of such an optical scanner include compactness in construction and reliability in operation.